Early Morning Hiccups – Nov. 13

BallinEurope’s man from Lithuania, known on these pages as “Y,” was apparently so hyped up by Žalgiris Kaunas’ marvelous win over Caja Laboral Baskonia that he was inspired to assess the Green-and-Whites’ early success in 2010-11. For Y., it’s all about the coach and the bench…

SF – Kleiza vs Lewis
It’s lose-lose at the 3. If Kleiza’s achilles is still bothering him, there’s no way he can hang with Lewis. If he can’t even play, the Raptors have no one who can begin to match-up here. Weems, while athletic, doesn’t have the size to bother Lewis (6″10). While Kleiza isn’t 6″10 either, he does have some strength which can compensate. At the end of the day, Lewis is only averaging 11pts 6rebs (all for the low-low price of $20mil), but if folks start doubling Howard (like I wish they wouldn’t but know they will), there’s going to be a lot of open shots for the guys on the perimeter.
Edge: Lewis

The schedule smiles on us again as two of the league’s three undefeateds square off when Montepaschi travels to Istanbul to knock off one of this year’s revelations, Fenerbahçe Ülker. Eleven more games plus a young Greek who took an opportunity and sprinted with it in this week’s preview.

– Mindset of the team: “We’ve got to stay positive. It’s early in the year. We can’t get down. We played a lot of good games. We shouldn’t be 1-6 right now. We should have a way better record than this. We just let a couple games get away. We’re right there.”

– Is the team’s confidence still there? “Seven games into the season, and you’re going to be down right now? We’re competitive. We all know we’re right there. We’ve had some bad stretches in the games and we get down. We can’t have that.”

LINAS KLEIZA: Slow down. He’s second on the team in turnovers. He’s forcing his game a bit and folks are guarding him tight in the regular season and his shooting is suffering (40% and 27% from threes). Start taking folks more into the post and do a better job without the ball with your movement creating offensive chances for you – keep the game simple. Putting it on the floor for more than one or two dribbles is getting him into trouble.

Cleveland, Ohio — Zydrunas Ilgauskas, a Cleveland Cavalier for 14 seasons, is playing a key role for the Miami Heat.

And, playing it well.

Ilgauskas, 35, has averaged 16.1 minutes coming off the bench in Miami’s first seven games. The 7-3 center is averaging 6.3 points on 59 percent field goal shooting, has grabbed 4.6 rebounds per game and is playing solid inside defense.

As the Catalan press reports Barcelona have made an offer to Simas Jasaitis after some of their key squad members suffered some injuries.

Last week Pascual had admitted that he was looking into the market for a possible signing, after losing at home to Fenerbahce. The club wanted to sign a guard/forward to replace Basile who will miss at least three months of action and their back court looked very thin in the past few weeks.

Linas Kleiza has been inconsistent, but should be a reliable source of points, threes, boards and steals this season. He was awful in his last game, as Sonny Weems came out of nowhere to ruin his night, but is still a guy I am in favor of hanging onto in most leagues. He’s owned in 68% of leagues.